


Eye for an eye

by Verse



Category: Pocket Monsters: Gold & Silver & Crystal | Pokemon Gold Silver Crystal Versions, pokemon double nuzlocke challenge - Fandom
Genre: Bittersweet Ending, Gen, Hunger Games AU, Werewolf AU, Zombie AU, Zombie Apocalypse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-08
Updated: 2018-06-08
Packaged: 2019-05-19 17:01:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 3
Words: 1,723
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14877791
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Verse/pseuds/Verse
Summary: A tragedy in three.





	1. Crystal

**Author's Note:**

> This was originally written for a fic contest in 2017.

It’s like she’d just swallowed liquid mercury. She’s choking, she’s drowning, dread tight as a snake around her throat. Her blood turns ice cold, cold as the voice resonating in the air. Kotone sends her a distressed look, a silent plea for help.

But unlike a solid meal or a torn-off shirt, her cousin can’t save her from the Hunger Games.

(Can she ?)

Rocket grunts come to seize the scared child (so small, so  _young_ ) and she can’t, she can’t accept this, she  _can’t_  , she  _won’t_ , no, not Kotone, no, no,  _NO_

She shoves Gold’s hand off her shoulder, refusing to meet his eyes.

(An eye for an eye)

(Her life for my betrayal)

 When the shout escapes her throat, silence falls heavy as her death sentence.

“  **I**   **volunteer**  ! ”

* * *

To be fair, she manages quite well the first few days.  She doesn’t starve, thanks to years of feeding her family ; she hides well, thanks to years of hanging out with Gold.

Sadly, no one is safe from pure, dumb bad luck.

Her ears are still ringing from the explosion; her entire body is agony. Next to her, lays the burned body of a less fortunate tribute.

Fuck. Fuck !

Everything. Hurts. Breathing. Moving. She wants… she wants out. Time out. Just five minutes.

But she can’t, of course ; she already sees movement coming from her right, and she has to leave, even if she has to crawl for it.

Come on. Come on ! Get up !

A shadow is hovering over her, ready to put an end to her pitiful struggle.

No. NO. She. She doesn’t want to die.

_She **wants**  to  **live**._

(Something buried deep, deep in her bones, an old flame of power,  _stirs_.)

Her hit draws blood off the other tribute’s leg.

The man jumps back with a pained yelp. He immediately gazes at her hand, looking for the knife.

There is no knife.

And that is no hand.

(An eye for an eye)

(My humanity for my survival)

* * *

She’s going insane.

Her body keeps changing, growing fur one hour and distorting her limbs the next. She’s a shapeshifting monster, stuck between a human and a beast. The only constant between the transformations is the burning feeling in her chest, and this isn’t exactly a comforting thing.

Literally the only reason she hasn’t lost her mind yet is because she keeps thinking, what would Gold do ?

(Go with the flow, of course. The boy could accidentally summon a demon he’d still find a way to be happy about it.)

* * *

She doesn’t immediately realize that something is wrong.

(Then again, none of the remaining tributes do.)

The first hint is the lack of cannon shot that night. But she, like all the others, assume simply that nobody died that day.

On the second night, she grows antsy. No death for two days in a row ? Something terrible is bound to happen. What will the Capitol throw at her ? Monsters ? Toxic gas ? She tries to remember what happened during the previous Hunger Games, theorizes what is the most likely to come in. It only terrifies her more.

On the third day, a tribute finds her.

His throat is torn open.

Crystal slams the zombie's head against the ground and  _runs_.

Only when her vision blurs, only when her breaths seem to kill her lungs, only then does she stop. Her legs slip under her and she passes out.

When she wakes up, two things hit her :

-She must have ran really, really fast

_-She’s out of the arena_


	2. Silver

One might think that the son of President Giovanni wouldn’t be so good at surviving the apocalypse.

Well, one would be wrong. Living in a paranoid household with a kleptomaniac hobo as your best friend  _does_  teach you some useful things.

When he hears screaming outside, he knows to check what it is about  _with_ a mean of defending himself.

When he sees swarms of dead people walking in the streets, he knows to loot anything that might be useful in the future on his way.

When his father calls desperately for his help, a zombie at his throat, Silver knows to save himself and abandon him.

At least, that’s something his father taught him right.

(An eye for an eye)

(Your life for my life)

* * *

When he meets Crystal, there’s blood dripping off his face, and her teeth are too big to fit in her mouth.

His first reflex is to reach for his bat, because even if she’s obviously alive, there is  _no way_  that girl is human; her huge body hunched forward reminds him of a persian who would have learned to walk; the light glowing through her shirt around her chest and stomach have gives him chills running down your spine; and her face is one of nightmare, long ears pointed and glowing eyes staring right at him.

“Are you hurt ?!”

The concern in her voice is so genuine he doesn’t know what to do.

“Uhm. No ? Not my blood.” He answers dumbly, because what else can you do when a two meters tall beef mountain act more concerned about you than your father ever has ?

“Oh. Good.” Is that relief ? He’s not sure. For all he knows, he could be delusional and hallucinating the whole conversation. “Hey would you happen to know how to go to district twelve from here ?”

* * *

They stick together, after that. At first out of necessity ; it’s safer to stay together, after all. Then, because they come to genuinely like each others.

“How does this” he asks one day, gesturing at the fur piercing her arms “even happen ? Like where is it even from.”

Crystal shrugs. “I have a few theories, but nothing certain. The only thing I can tell you for sure is that it seems to be tied to my emotions. When I’m really angry, or scared, or distressed, I shift.”

Interesting, in a creepy way. What could be the origin of that ?

“Maybe one of my ancestors was really close to his arcanine ?”

Wow. Okay. No. Thank you for the mental image, Crystal.

She laughs, though, and he can’t help but do to, because when the world turns upside down you need to find joy wherever you can.

“Doesn’t it bother you, though ?” he asks when he can breath again.

"At first, yeah." Once again, she shrugs.  "I choked a child to death for the amusement of the Capitol. I don’t really  _feel_  human anymore.“

* * *

It starts as any other days would have. Crystal gets back human teeth and human legs, and grows a mane down her spine instead. Silver sharpens his axes and add scissors to his bat with duck tape.

And then they meet  ** _him_**.

Silver is ready to ax him to death, as usual. Rotting flesh and missing eye are kind of dead giveaways that their owner is a zombie.

But Crystal, in a very un-Crystal fashion, freezes, eyes wide as plates.

"Gold ?" her voice is faint, like a prayer.

But more surprisingly, the zombie’s head snap in her direction, and he  _speaks_.

"Crystal ?"


	3. Gold

Gold doesn’t remember much. That is, almost nothing.

What he does remember, is an unhealthy hate for the Capitol (whatever that is) and that he really, really loves Crystal.

It goes back though, slowly, a little more every weeks. Laughter, in the trees. Hunting together. Dreaming of escaping the district. Reading together-

_Reading_

He chokes on air when the swarm of memories come back. It’s messy, and fuzzy, but he, he, he  _remembers_ , he

"You volunteered." He doesn’t mean for it to sound accusatory.

"That I did." Her tone is defiant. 'Fight me,' it implies. 'I don’t regret a thing.'

'We used to read. Together.' Crystal seems puzzled, but he’s too busy trying to get a grasp of the memories before they leave. "I- I remembered something. Something in your books. After you were reaped, I read your books, about the legends, and the myths, and I knew nobody would follow me there-"

"Gold, you’re not making any sense."

He takes a deep breathe. In. Out. In.

Out.

"I don’t remember what I was looking for in your books, but I found it. I went to Mount Silver because of it. And whatever it was, it’s linked to all of this."

* * *

The travel up Mt Silver is… really, really long. Especially so that unlike himself, who can’t feel temperatures anymore, or Crystal, who constantly has a raging inferno in her belly and occasionally some bonus thick fur, Silver doesn’t handle well the cold. Thankfully, cuddles usually help. But still.

Eventually, they  _do_  manage to reach the top.

What they find up there takes their breath away.

Silver sees a giant hole in the sky, badly stitched back together. Crystal sees wooden doors sealed by golden chains.

Gold sees himself.

"What are those ?"

"The doors to the other side." Maybe his mirrored self is speaking. Maybe it’s him. Maybe it doesn’t matter.

"… like in that children’s book ? About Ho-oh ?"

Precisely.

”"If they’re closed, no wonder we have zombies everywhere.  _Why_  are they though ?"

Oh, he knows.

He wishes he didn’t.

"It’s me. I’m holding them closed. My soul is holding them closed."

(An eye for an eye)

(Her life for my betrayal)

“I was angry. I was sad.” he tries to explains himself, even if can’t  _excuse_  his own actions “I wanted you to not die. I wanted all of it to stop, the Reaping, the Hunger Games, the districts, the Capitol.”

“So I forced it all to stop. ”

* * *

A tribute, the son of the president, and a forgettable district boy walk over the roof of the world.

It sounds like the beginning of a joke.

This is how this story ends.

Most people will say, later, that the zombies just dropped dead without warning. Fewer people, who happened to be near the frontier between what will later become Kanto and Johto, will describe a flash of light on top of the mountain, and the most impressive avalanche ever witnessed.

Time will pass. Society will build itself again, a little fairer, a little stronger. Things will change. The story of the dreaded Hunger Games, the hated Capitol, the infamous zombie apocalypse, will be lost to the crushing jaws of time.

Nobody will recover the three bodies beneath the snow.

(An eye for an eye)

(Peace for our lives)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have a lot of mixed feelings about this but I sure ain't rewriting it now so.

**Author's Note:**

> The tumblr's versegm folks


End file.
